Sorry! We haven't switched to Tuesday; I've just gotten into a bad habit of slacking.

Challenge #44 (opposites) is closed.

Challenge #45 takes its lead from the holiday; the topic is heart. In any sense that you choose.

god, hearts

The tech all but snarls. "You know, we could be running this test on someone who's really sick."

Follow-up tech. "Boy, your results came back beautiful! I hope my heart looks that good when I'm your age."

Fill-in doctor. "But you're too young to have heart problems. Are you sure it's not indigestion?"

ER doctor. "A lot of time panic attacks feel like heart attacks. Just sit here for a few minutes and try to relax."

Cardiologist. "I'm going to bet you've lost a parent fairly young to heart problems, right? Genetics suck, don't they? If we can't fix this any other way, we might need to go for a pacemaker."

At least now it's being treated.

(hopefully someone has happy heart stories)

6 September 1994

What did you feel?

You'd have been under, of course; heart surgery is still the cracking open of the fragile shell that contains the core, still the splitting of the envelope, still the hinterland between life and death, where risk and infection and the beckoning light on the other side lay in waiting.

What did you feel?

Was there a moment, something penetrating the fog of unconsciousness, panic, a slipping through of voices, we're losing him clear damn it clear no good and then that damned light?

What did you feel? And for a moment - did you remember me?

9/14/01, University Presbyterian Church, Seattle

At noon the church is jammed with people trying to make sense of a world gone mad. We thought we were early, but are lucky to get seats in the balcony. Soon they’re seating people in the choir.

Halfway through the opening hymn, I notice one of the women in the choir is wearing an I (heart) NY t-shirt.

I am in black. I couldn’t bring myself to wear red, white, and blue. Even in the midst of grief and shock I’m a cynic. I love this country. I’m American to my core. But the people running this country want to use my patriotism to their own ends, so I refuse to surrender it to them.

I am also dry-eyed. I’m thinking, analyzing, speculating. Under stress, I turn off my heart and let my brain take charge. I trust it more.

But when I see that t-shirt I weep and cannot stop.

Susan, this is a lovely drabble. I think the phrase "my superior brain" might alienate a reader, though, unless it was meant to be self-mocking.

I am such a slacker. I can't seem to summon 100 words on any given subject these days. Am working on it.

Hmm. I meant that my brain is superior to my heart, not that it's superior to all the other brains. How to reword..... t ponders

...and it's edited.

So much better, Susan. The added sentence is very revealing and poignant.

Liese, I love that lyric. It scans like a dream. But I think you need one more verse, since you're starting and ending with chorous.

I liked it too, but perhaps that's like, duh, coming from...well, I would say a cop groupie, but they are such hard-living hard-drinking skanks that that gives me a total wig. And "heart" is giving me a lot of images...we'll see what kind comes up first.

OK, I know this isn't my place, but I'd be psyched if a jock or someone would write a drabble with "the kid's got heart." I just don't have it in me.